to think that people on here are not rescuers and that they get far too involved?

[wannaBe]

I've just read a thread where a poster has said that if she had the money she would hire a private detective to track someone down to make sure she was ok.

I am constantly baffled by the lengths that some posters seem to think it is their right to go to to get involved in someone else's problems they've posted online.

In the years I've been here I've seen posters call ambulances/the police/social services/ask mn to track people down etc.

Apart from the fact that most drama threads are trolls, why is it that people seem to think that they have the right to get so personally involved in someone else's life without being asked to, purely because the person has posted about it on here? The whole aim of mn is that it's anonomous, surely?

Tbh it's like competitive do-gooding.

And that's before we get to the possibility of a poster being a troll and someone getting seriously hurt one day...

YABU. People care. I think it's good. I don't consider it a competition.

I've done things for people on here, they've done things for me (thank you to Mirage and MilkNoSugarPlease for the fish pencils!). I've met MNers in RL and the vast, vast majority of people here (like most people in RL) are good and normal.

From this and your other posts on what you feel people should or shouldn't post on MN, I think it's you that's the cynical one.

I agree with you. This is a great source of support but you need to be sure it's appropriate and wanted by the person posting. Shame people didn't read something like the op before the whole Riven saga. Riven's child ended up on the front of every paper because people were 'trying to help'

So I shouldnt have bothered to help out an MNer the other day when she has ballsed something up and I could help? Or the other 2 people that offered to help too?

We should have just said "oh, what a shame, try not to do it again" instead of what we actually did which is help her solve her problem?

Wannabe, there is a lot in what you say.
I keep seeing threads where someone posts about being in a crisis or stuck without car in the middle of nowhere, snd someone says 'I wonder if there is a MN-er nearby who can come and help you', and I think who in their right mind will go alone to an address in the middle of nowhere, to rendezvous with someone called 'IAmAParrot'.
Or who, alone at night with a sick child, would give their address to someone they'd never met called 'CuntyPants' off the internet and open the door to them?

MN is an internet forum, not the 4th Emergency Service.

YANBU. I think sometimes it is a competition actually. as in
'Look, I care more, I can do this'
That and the Miss Marple investigation team that suddenly sprouted up nearly 4 years ago...

Support is what we can and should offer, somewhere to vent, somewhere safe to rant, a caring ear and advice.
Nothing more.
IMO

I see what you mean and I'd be very wary of helping a total stranger/new poster.

But I've met some mn'ers and consider them my friends but I guess thats different.

I have had loads of very generous help from lots of MN-ers - generally people I have been posting with for years, many who have been to meet ups. People have sent me things, I have sent things to others. Online advice - invaluable.

But that's all v different from arranging or suggesting a RL meet up with someone who has just appeared, in quite isolated circumstances. And I have seen some of those suggested lately.

I totally agree with you Blu.

I think that the internet communities is like this in general.

It is beneficial sometimes. Even Evony is a life-saver!

Bogey, that is not what wannabe meant.
I personally have sent MNer's fabric/books/small items when I have something and they need help or advice.

What I would not do is start an internet hunt/googling people's details and finding addresses/locations so that someone can break every known law of internet chatrooms and find a random poster because of somethign they have written.

Lovecat - I agree with you.

I agree that people need to be careful if they are meeting someone in the middle of the night down a country lane - other than that, I think we're mostly a pretty good bunch of people who just want to help others out when we can.

Sorry Ilythia if I offended (?) you offering to look after the girls when MIL was ill :( It certainly had nothing to do with competitive helping, just wanting to help someone out if I could.

YANBU

I will give you all my savings, my house and my children, because you obviously are in depserate need of it all you poor poor love have a cup of tea and leave your DH he's a bastard.

I feel v sorry for the kind person who got sucked into the Victoria Station Toilet Trollery last week, but thought it was interesting that at the same time as one poster was runniing a rescue mission to a public toilet in a busy public place, there was another thread where the majority of posters said they would not allow their 8 year old, even 10 and 12 year old children, to go into busy public toilets alone, and loads of people citing assaults in various busy public toilets as the reason.

Wannabe is not talking about the tremendous support and kindness that does take place, but where that boundary is crossed.

but there's a vast difference between sending someone some pencils and wanting to call the police/ss/hire a private detective to track them down, don't
you think?

People get far too caught up in the drama. And yes I am cynical. Because most of these desparate threads where people get caught up in their need to help
turn out to be trolls and there is real potential for people to get hurt, both emotionally and financially but one day perhaps even physically.

Look at the support people gave to cvq, who turned out to be a troll. dizzymare, who turned out to be a troll, the pooh poster, who turned out to be a troll. Ethanchristopher who was targetting young mums who.... turned out to be a troll. That fox troll from some years back, people were arranging a place for her to stay, clothes for her children, money for her, a mn'er met her in rl and held her baby while she apparently packed a suitcase... she was a troll. The list is endless, and tbh I don't there's been a desparate thread on here that hasn't turned out to be a troll.

Over time you can build a relationship with people online. And tbh sending someone some pencils or other things is effectively no different to selling them on ebay - you're giving your address to a stranger. But it is not the same as becoming emotionally, financially and personally involved.

Absolutely wannabe.

Lol @ 'MN is an internet forum, not the 4th Emergency Service'

What about spookycharlotte though, or the woman who posted recently that she was unexpectedly looking after a newborn and didn't have anything to feed her.

So that toliet in Victoria thread from last week was all made up then? And someone actually went there to help?

Crikey.

Oh, Victoria Station Toilet Trollery?

I read it as trolley. I had images of someone being sucked head first into a trolley in the middle of Victoria station.

Many years ago on Ebay I got involved in a thread which was later confirmed by newspaper reports.

A regular had her newly ex hammering at the door to be let in.
According to her he had form for beating her up in front of the kids
we - on that board - advised her to stay online chatting to us, get the kids in there with her in front of the puter watching what we said and NOT let him.
What was a domestic turned into a public disturbance.
Police dealt, they got the court order, she has never looked back.

BUT
having seen so many trolls over the years I always try to talk common sense and not get drawn in.

Sam's case was unusual - the reality turned out to be worse than her posts
but most are not.

wannabe my thread as humanbean and huntress was truly desperate and Mumsnet got me through.
It was the second emergency service after my friends who livea LONG way from here.

I shall name some of them:

Geordieminx
anniegetyourgun
tribpot
quintessentialshadows
pageturner
thumbwitch
buda
balloonslayer

many many others

Along with RL great friends.

People like Buda and thumbwitch were up in the night my time. Don't cut off this lifeline for posters.

I am nearly three years on now. Dont be so blimmin smug and knowall

For many posters over the years I would suggest that Mumsnet has in fact been an emergency service.

I saw that line the OP mentions and thought it was completely inappropriate.

Recently, someone PM'd me saying she'd worked out where I lived (I'm not subtle, it must be said), and noticed I was in the same area as another poster who was apparently in a very bad way mentally.

I did offer to get some groceries in for her, but also felt a bit uneasy and wouldn't have gone anywhere without DH and a phone. As it turned out, the person in question didn't want any RL help either. I think everyone was well-meaning, but it really made me question what was happening. People who had no RL knowledge of me, and no RL knowledge of her, were very keen that we should meet up and I should help her.

I'm not sure what would have been right and I do think the people on that thread were being very kind. But I have been thinking about this thread a lot and wondering what on earth I could really have done, if the person on it had wanted me to help. Sure, I could have left a bag of groceries at her door without too much trouble - but would that just have made her RL friends less aware that she was struggling? I could (in theory) have walked her to the GP - but in all honesty, I wouldn't have done that without DH. I wouldn't have been able to go into her house or anything like that, and I couldn't have contacted her GP for her or done any of the things RL friends do.

I do think this is qualitatively different from the situations where someone starts a thread with 'help, I'm stranded in X place' or 'Anyone in Y town?', or similar. Random errands or the passing on of old baby stuff is quite different from checking up on people in tricky situations like the OP here is talking about, or like the thread I was on with someone in poor mental health.